The present invention relates to oral treatment products, and more particularly to oral treatment devices, related compositions to treat a subject's teeth, and related methods of manufacture of the compositions.
Many people desire to have whiter, brighter teeth. Accordingly, the oral care industry has developed a variety of products that contact the teeth and/or gums to provide a desired effect, such as whitening the teeth. An example of a whitening product is a rigid plastic dental tray including a trough configured for placement over a user's dental arch. A bead of extruded treatment composition including a whitening agent, such as peroxide, is disposed within the trough so that the composition theoretically contacts the teeth adequately when the tray is placed over the teeth.
Frequently, however, the treatment composition of these whitening products is formulated so that the bead will not liquefy when stored for long periods or in warm temperatures. As a result, when at normal room temperature, the treatment composition beads of such whitening products usually are a semi-solid to solid rubbery mass, which is resistant to spreading or significant deformation. Such a bead poses an issue for a user when applying the dental tray because the user must apply significant force to deform the bead enough so that the composition spreads across the teeth, and also penetrates the interproximal spaces between adjacent teeth. With sensitive or structurally compromised teeth, this can be painful or can physically damage the teeth.
One attempt to address the issue with semi-solid treatment composition beads is presented in U.S. Pat. No. 6,860,736 to Allred, which is hereby incorporated by reference in its entirety. Allred discloses a thin and flexible dental tray that is coated with a dental treatment composition forming a thin layer substantially covering the interior of the tray (replacing conventional, linear beads). This composition solidifies sufficiently to form an endoskeleton, which physically supports the walls of the dental tray, helping it maintain a tray like configuration before use. This endoskeleton is a substantially solid, but formable material, which provides support to the dental tray of Allred.
Due to its substantially solid state, however, the Allred endoskeleton is in a thick, relatively unspreadable putty like or rubbery form, which can be difficult to deform and spread over the teeth adequately. Indeed, to ensure that the endoskeleton adheres to the teeth, an adhesion agent, such as carboxypolymethylene or a polyvinyl pyrrolidone polymer is added to the Allred composition, which can add to the cost, processing time and chemical complexity of the composition.